1. Provide some thoughtful reflection on how this exercise might be useful to you in future performances. Do you have trouble with audience awareness? Explore a time (or times) in performance when the audience intruded into your work - and remember, that includes anytime you were not in the moment, i.e., you started worrying about whether you were doing something right, what your line was, etc. How would regularly using this exercise help?
2. Going beyond the issues of audience awareness, what are some reasons to use this exercise anyway? What other possible skills might it develop?
RESPONSES DUE BY 9 A.M., SATURDAY 10/22.
Bailey Olmstead
ReplyDelete1. This exercise proves helpful in the sense that you must remember the audience is not there. On the opening night of The Drowsy Chaperone, the audience was laughing so hard. As a cast, we had been rehearsing in an empty auditorium, with no one to laugh at our jokes. The moment I stepped onstage opening night, I could feel the audience smiling, and it immediately effected me. I performed bigger, feeding off the audience. That night became about me pleasing the audience, finding the littlest things to make them laugh about. When you use the fourth wall, your performance becomes more about your character, instead of what the audience wants.
2. Using the fourth wall can help in the development of your character in addition to audience awareness. By surrounding yourself in your space, instead of the stage, you get a better feel for what your character is dealing with and how the environment impacts them.
1)I believe that it is always important to have a world created for your character. When on stage, you must be immersed in this world, from all four walls. It helps to completely develop your character and its relationships with the surroundings it is subjected to. As Bailey said, when the audience is laughing, it really helps. However, as your character, I do not believe that you should be completely aware of a room of people looking at you. Rather, you should be engrossed in the settings of the scene.
ReplyDelete2)This exercise could help with memory and creativity. You are committing a certain area to memory, and need to recreate that memory every time you are onstage. Creatively, it gives you a venue to truly explore your character's surroundings.
Ashley
1. As an actor, there is nothing that makes me question my performance more than thinking of the people in the audience. Unfortunately, there are certain situations in acting (especially comedic acting a la The Drowsy Chaperone) when your audience will react to you regardless--at that point, you need to be able to block them out. The establishment of a fourth wall could be a very useful tool for an actor to block out their audience. Especially when cheating out in tacky musical manner, an actor should be able to see something in the audience other than faces: something they can drill their gaze into and something consistent.
ReplyDelete2. Hagen's exercises build on an actor's ability to develop every small detail in his performance and utilize such knowledge to fully immerse himself in the acting. Exercising that idea--that commitment to being fully aware of your surroundings--strengthens a certain integrity in your performing. The fourth wall exercise is a perfect contributor to that process, and also provides an actor a certain degree of comfort and courage to use their space more efficiently (if appropriate).
1. This would be useful to me because I've had so much more time onstage where i was looking at the audience. In my dance performances there is absolutely no establishing the fourth wall, it's just me looking at an audience, and sometimes when i would see people who i knew very well it would make me nervous or happy. Or like in drowsy when I looked at my friend and she did something funny and I started laughing during a song. I hadn't established that those people are just overhearing and aren't actually there.
ReplyDelete2. Having that other wall there brings in more emotion I think, because it literally makes you feel like there is nobody else there but you and the other actors with you. When you are super aware of your audience you might play it up a bit more than if you were alone with these people having a moment.
Tug of War: Tug of War exercise helped me to improvise a scene because it taught me that you have to be realistic and make shure that you aren't pulling a lot of the rope and trying to make it realistic without having an actual rope. This was a fun challenge that I enjoyed.
ReplyDeleteTast and Smell: The taste and smell exercise helped me to be focused and get into imagining what the food tastes like, imagine the texture and for a brief moment I believed that I was actually eating the food.
Three Changes Activity: This was a little more challenging for me to change three things without being really obvious. Eventhough it was more difficult I enjoyed this activity and it did help me to improve my skill.
The Mirror Activity: The Mirror activity really helped me to improve my senses by focusing on my partners actions and really try to let my body feel and follow her every move in sync.
The Ball: this was a very fun activity. It was more challenging than I thought it would be to keep the ball the same size.
The Conversation With Involvement: Helped me to not only keep the conversation flowing but to really take the time to make my actions of eating realistic and all in all lI had a fun time with all six of these activities learning and improving my sensory skills. London W.
1. Establishing a fourth wall for me is very important. Anything can through me off during a performance, so i must prepare myself before a show so i do not let the audience distract me. During my performances in Pride and Prejudice my friends often attempted to get my attention while i was onstage. It broke my focus in the scene and would almost make me miss my ques.
ReplyDelete2. It helps you to focus in on your acting and away from the outside world. This will enhance the reality of the scene and give a more centered concentration on all elements of good acting and characterization
The fourth wall exercise is extremely helpful in my acting. Often times in theater you can't have the physical object your character may be using, such as a mirror. Learning to see what isn't there allows the audience to see it with you. The audience can be distracting sometimes, perhaps when they laugh when you weren't expecting it. The fourth wall allows you to erase them and focus on your scene and your character.
ReplyDelete